1. Field of the Invention
This invention refers to a method for manufacturing boards made up of a mixture that mainly contains derivatives of sunflower seed husks and more particularly to boards obtained from raw material consisting in fibers of sunflower seed husks.
2. Description of the Related Arts
The sunflower seed husk is a waste material which is generated as a by-product in the process of producing sunflower oil.
Up to now the main application of this by-product was its use as fuel to obtain the energy necessary for that same oil production process, thus using only a part thereof. It is also used, though to a lesser extent, as a bed for fowl houses.
The fiber of this vegetable by-product, which is digestible and has a length similar to that of certain wood showed that the husk of this seed was a potential raw material for the production of MDF boards similar to wooden boards.
These MDF boards, which are generally used in the construction industry to replace wooden planks, are made up of particles or fibers pressed together with a binding element.
The most well-known of these boards are the planks made of wooden particles or MDF boards, structural boards of the OSB-type (oriented-structure boards) which replace plywood, gypsum boards, which are a mixture of fibers and plaster replacing materials previously used in construction partition walls, and boards of the MDF-type (Medium Density Fiberboard), which replace solid wood planks.
Different types of vegetable fibers, particularly coming from different kinds of wood and also from fibrous stems as the cotton stem and the sugar cane bagasse, are used in the manufacture of boards of the MDF-type.
The fiber and gypsum boards used in the building industry are made of a mixture of gypsum with cellulosic fibers obtained from wood or pulp obtained from coarse paper and other materials such as pearlite mineral, lime, starch, potassium sulfate or binder.
Preliminary studies have shown that the use of this biomass of sunflower husks to replace wood for its use in the manufacture of particle boards using conventional methods did not have successful results as the minimum necessary characteristics in the final product were not obtained.
The known MDF-type boards are obtained from different types of wood subjected to a transformation process in little pieces which are later classified.
These pieces, after a cleaning and washing process, are subjected, along with heat and steam pressure, to a mechanic process for the removal of fibers by means of especially designed refining discs.
The fiber is then mixed with a binding resin and other chemicals, then passes through a drying process and next, by means of special conveyors, the mixture is carried to a mattress formation and pressing station, where the board is given its shape and consistency.
Methods for the production of boards from wood particles or the like have been described in Argentine patents No. 72,346; No. 81,487; No. 173,944; No. 174,901; No. 199,988; No. 202,331; No. 208,633; No. 218,441; No. 217,725; No. 219,692; No. 225,631 and No. 225,752 but none of these patents have disclosed that the raw material used comes from sunflower seed husks.
Soviet Union Patent No. 1724619 A1 makes reference to the use of sunflower seed husks but in gypsum boards.
Even if the Russian Federation Patent No. 5013331 mentions the use of sunflower seed husks in the manufacture of particle boards, on the one hand the components used in the binding material for the manufacture of boards are different from those used in the method of the present invention and, on the other hand, the process steps are also different as they do not refer to boards of the MDF-type.